A ridiculously over tooled tweak… I actually made a custom drill guide on a lathe to accomplish that, and it’s was machined out of some leftover high tempered steel… Way overkill but it got the job done…
Well I don’t believe any two of the plates are identical on this shell unlike the common plans… But yeah it’s the often left out and not included on plans 15th plate under the ribbon cable clamp…
Nope, rest assured it’s there on the real packs, if you look real carefully you can catch a glimpse of it on some of the reference photos on this site…
So, when you mentioned that most MB’s possibly need to be reworked to fit the shell pulls, did you mean that the shells themselves are going to be smaller in some areas and bigger in others?
Since the shell was built with mostly measurements taken from a real pack vs any of the currently available plans it differs in a few areas… Nothing huge, mostly just a smidgen here and there…
When I get the mold made and a new pull I will outline it in more detail with pictures… But, before then the laser cut boards made to Stefan’s plans are real close, but there are little areas here and there that are not ‘perfect’ a little shy here and there and a little heavy here and there, the only real noticeable big issue is the little block on the bottom left where the injector hoses go into, it’s shifted about 3/16" or so so on one side 3/16" of it will need to be filed off the motherboard, and in all honesty the little bit it’s shy on the other side is not noticeable unless you really look..
The rest of the shell fit to the motherboard is give or take 1/16" or so, easily as good of fit as the originals…
It is Wal-Mart cheap walnut colored paint, it’s much more ‘orange’ then what I thought it would look like… I let the girlfriend pick the paint as it really had no bearing on any thing at this point and black just seemed too generic for the master… It’s all dull now anyway as it’s in the process of getting a complete surface wet sand, and then a wax job so it’s not going to look all that pretty since I’m not buffing it back to a shine…
*Even though you appear to be finished, do you/did you plan to incorporate this cosmetic piece [that was pointed out by someone else in a different thread]?:
*And if not, does anyone have any better pictures of this piece? I obviously don’t see it hard to replicate it and add it to a pre-existing shell, but need better reference to achieve the best results if I have to go that route…
*Thanks guys…I forgot what the original thread said that was, however I did remember the pictures, and it was driving me nuts, as to what exactly that was…And yes I tried searching for the thread, however I was using words other than “bracket”, as I forgot what the thing was called, as previously mentioned…Not that it would’ve made much of a difference, in the long-run, as it’s hidden behind the ribbon/clamp…
*On another note, Exoray - How much do you think you’d price the shells for, if you are going to do a run of them? Would like to know how much I have to save up for this puppy ;-)…
*And does anyone make resin N-Filters? Don’t wanna have to go the “can-'o-soup” route…
Won’t deny there is some curve there but I have to wonder how much of it is the result of warping in the fiberglass from either a bad layup (too much catalyst creates too much heat and polyester resin shrinks and warps with heat) or being pulled from the mold too soon…
In the end I have said the shell is still idealized, I didn’t aim for the exact screen accurate finish and blemishes, overall the screen used packs were sloppy… I wanted to go more for the “as new” look… If you want to dirty it up and scratch it up upon building that is always an option, but as built the pulls should have almost a mirror like finish to the surface, with crisp lines…
Wow, I never knew they used an L bracket to help support the injector tubes! Now I don’t feel as bad for doing this to my pack, although I feel slightly deflated that my stroke of genius wasn’t all that original!
That could make for interesting options with painting, crisp lines with battered paint over it gives the impression of something much more damage resistant than fiberglass, yes?
Yeah you can be creative, using the ‘hammered metal’ spray paint you can build up a rough texture over the surface, and if you want the ‘boogers’ like the real packs had you can mist it with some of the ‘stone texture’ paint, want some scratches and sorts hit certain areas with 40 or 60 grit sand paper or a file and instantly turning it into an ugly weathered pack…